Artist Jo Howell ventures into the realm of film processing for her latest community project with Equal Arts in the North East of England.
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I will hold my hands up and confess that I have not processed a film since around 2016 and I have never tried caffenol processing. I am sincerely hoping that it is like riding a bike! Though I do remember how frustrating it is to work in a changing bag!
In true eco warrior fashion I am going to attempt the less toxic caffenol development, then to stop and fix it with chemicals labelled as being first opened in October 1999! The film itself is from 2016 and was used in a plastic holga pinhole camera.
Basically I am expectation managing my own hopes. There are innumerable things that may not work or could go wrong. Let’s get cracking.
Caffenol Recipe:
- Coffee caffeine (made in a 9 cup stove top coffee machine)
- Vitamin C
- Soda Ash
- Water
Equipment for film processing
- Processing drum with spool
- Saucepan
- Stirrer
- Funnel
- Measuring cylinder or jug
- Thermometer
- Scissors
- Changing bag or completely blacked out room
- Access to heat – to combine ingredient
Method
Step 1
Get your equipment ready. Clean, dry and ready to start.
Step 2
Boil the kettle. I was making 500ml of caffenol. I was making espresso coffee in a 12 cup stovetop coffee maker.
Step 3
Using approximately 100ml of the remaining boiling water. Add to a measuring jug. Then add 6 level teaspoons of soda ash and 2 level teaspoons of vitamin C. Mix until dissolved.
Step 4
Add your espresso coffee to the measuring jug. If you have some space to add ice if you want it to cool more quickly.
Step 5
Wait until the mixture reaches 20c before using.
Step 6
Using the black bag get your film onto the spool and into the processing drum ready to add the caffenol once it reaches temperature.
Step 7
Do 11 minutes of processing. Agitate every 30 seconds until time.
Step 8
Pour away caffenol. Add stop bath 1 minute.
Step 9
Keep the stop bath for the next round.
Step 10
Fix the film for 5 minutes.
Step 11
Keep the fix for the next one.
Step 12
Wash in running water for 10 minutes.
Final step
Hang dry.
These examples I have photographed and inverted to the positive image on my iPhone 11 so they are a little rough and ready. I have so far processed 3 films today but the images on the other 2 films are a bit disappointing.
The film that did work is one of my old ones from 2016 when my cat Oscar was alive. I have one more film to process today.
